Rooftop

2.

We pass through Las Vegas, then eventually end up on the Pacific Crest Highway. Mom tells me that it won't be any more than fifteen minutes until we reach Carpinteria, a little beach town that we somehow could afford a house in. Mom was starting to get really tired of living in a place where no one liked us, and had always wanted to live by the ocean.

"You ready?" She looks worried. She really does want this to work out.

"Yeah," I tell her with a small smile on my face. "I'm ready."

Another few minutes pass until we finally pull up in front of a mustard yellow house, with a concrete lined roof. It looked a lot better in the pictures. But, if I'm not in Arizona anymore, it's worth it.

I grab a box from the back of the moving van, and take it up to what is now my new bedroom. It has a spring bed pushed up against the wall, and a window that's already been propped open. The man who was just driving the van, comes up and, with the help of my mom, sets the book shelf into my room.

"Where do you want us to put this, honey?" My mom asks me, obviously in a very good mood, and with a good reason to be feeling that way. I tell them to put it in the right corner of my room, next to the window.

I go back down to the car and grab the rest of my boxes, so I can start setting everything up. My mom left a stack of thin sheets on the top of the unmade bed, and a nightstand next to my bed. I set up a reading lamp, and put all of my classic rock records onto the shelf, making sure not to get slinters in the process. I put my record player in a corner, where it won't get broken or messed with. I put a Queen record onto it and hum along to the familiar tune, while dusting everything, and putting a couple of old pictures and other nick-nacks into various places.

"Hey," someone says to me, from behind my back. I turn around quickly, with my arms up, ready to punch the man if I need to. Back in Arizona I would take boxing classes every week for a couple of years, so in other words, I would give Rocky quite the fight.

"What the hell are you doing in my room?" I yell at him, with my fists held up, still ready to hit him.

"What's your name?" I start to lower my fists. I'm still pissed, but don't think that he's actually going to hurt me.

"How the hell are you in my room?" I ask, still yelling.

"You know, I am so happy that I finally have a neighbor who's my age, the last people who lived here were these old husband and wife, who probably thought moving to Florida after you retire was overrated, and decided to move here instead." I'm just now starting to look at him. He has soft-looking brown hair, tan skin with no pimples, and some really great looking cheekbones. I've just met him, and am already super jealous of his looks," So anyways, neighbor girl, what's your name?"

"Columbia." I decided to stop trying to convince myself he wants to kill me, and since I really do need friends, I sit down on the bed, ready to have a civil conversation with him.

"Well, hi there Columbia. My name's Brad." He sits down on the windowsill, and we start talking.

"So, where you from?" He asks me, looking me in the eyes. His immediate act of self-confidence is already making me uncomfortable, and I look at my bookshelf instead.

"Arizona."

"What's it like there?" I think for a moment. I don't know how to sum up what Arizona is, especially not to someone who doesn't actually live there.

"It's boring. But in all fairness they have this really amazing coffee shop called Kaffe that's really close to me. I would spend most of my time in there." There is a short, almost long enough to be awkward, silence, before Brad speaks again.

"There's a really cool coffee place here. I could take you there after you finish unpacking." I look at my last box and decide that I can finish it after we get the coffee. I take it and put it in the corner, next to my record player, which Brad has started humming along to.

"You like this song?" I ask him, as the humming starts to get a little bit louder and more in tune with the music.

"Yeah. It's my favorite Queen song." I smile at him.

"It's mine, too." We look at each other in silence for around 10 seconds, until I finally speak, breaking the awkward lull.

"So, you ready to get some coffee?" He nods and climbs out the window.

"What the hell are you doing?" I yell at him from my window.

"How did you think I got in?" He yells back to me, now from the ground. I quickly run down to the road to catch up with him. I meet him in front of my front door, and check to make sure my wallet is still in my back pocket, and luckily, it is.

We walk down the street trying to make polite conversation, though it's a little bit difficult, because we don't know anything about each other, except that we both like Queen.

"So," I trail off, trying to think of a question to ask him. "What's your favorite movie?"

He thinks for a moment, before speaking. "Rocky Horror."

"Never seen it."

He has a look of mock horror on his face, then goes back to his normal smile. "I guess we'll have to watch it sometime." We walk another block, which makes me feel like I'm drowning in water, because of all the humidity from the ocean, until we stopped and went inside a coffee shop called The Bean. The shop is made out of bricks, and has a bunch of paintings on the inside.

"Hey Brad," A blonde barista says to him. "What do you want today?"

"Large Cappuccino." He looks at me, and motions for me to order.

"A large Americano, with a little bit of room on top." I motion with my fingers how much room for milk I want. She nods and we hand her a five dollar bill, which is able to pay for both coffees.

We wait for a couple of minutes, in the back room, and try to learn a little bit more about each other, until the barista calls out Brad's and my order. He quickly gets up and brings them back to the table. I take a big sip of the Americano I ordered, and try to figure out what's different about the flavor. It's definitely different. I don't know if it's better or worse, though.

"Earth to Columbia." Brad snaps his fingers in front of my face, "Do you want a tour?"

"Yeah, a tour sounds great," I tell him. I really should figure out what else is around me. So far all I know is the ocean, Brad's house, and a coffee shop.

"Awesome, let's get on it then." He stands up quickly and I follow him out of the shop. Even though I've just met him, he is probably the peppiest person I have ever met. I honestly think that he has to be here at least 5 times a day to have that much energy.

"Alright, that's Rainbow, it's an ice cream shop." He points at a brightly colored, concrete building, with a lot of paintings of rainbows, ice cream, and other things that you would assume a kindergartener had decided to put on the building. He points to a place called Tony's afterwards, "That's an Italian place, which, I've only actually been in once, because the service isn't great. That's

Rite-Aid, which is pretty much just a convenience store, like Vons, which is over there. Um, that's the theater over there, and that's the thrift shop."

I look down at my phone, and realize that by now, it's 8:30. "I should probably be getting home, by now, before my mom gets worried about me being gone. See you tomorrow?"

"Yeah. I'll see you tomorrow." He walks down to Rainbow, and I go back to my house, where my mom is waiting in the kitchen.

"I ordered a pizza, do you want any?" My mom asks me, motioning to the box next to her. I grab a piece and run upstairs to my room with it.

I plop down on my, still unmade, bed, and see that Brad added his number to my phone at some point today. I smile and text him a simple Hey, but conk out before he can text me back.

---
I decided that I should post another chapter so here it is.
~Fawn